Lubrication systems in machinery, aircraft and vehicles require that their lubricants, viz., oil, and oil filters be replaced periodically in order to maintain the good working order of the engine and machinery. For passenger automobiles, many mechanics recommend a oil and filter change every 3,000 miles of travel to maintain maximum engine life. Professional truckers put thousands of miles on their trucks every week and wait many, many hours for oil changes over the course of a year.
Replacing the oil in a motor vehicle typically involves placing a large oil drain basin under the oil pan, removing the drain plug, thereby allowing the oil to drain therein, and unscrewing the oil filter from the engine block. Due to designs of most engines, it has been difficult to remove oil filters without spilling oil onto the frame of the vehicle, the vehicle engine, on the mechanics and/or the ground. This practice is not only messy, but is environmentally unsound. Since many oil changes are conducted when the oil is very hot, spillage from an oil filter upon removal also poses a safety hazard to mechanics.
Accordingly there is a need for a tool for oil filter drainage which is not only easy to use, simple in design, inexpensive to manufacture and which provides for leak proof operation, but which is designed to last a long term at a low cost.
It is thus an object of the tool for oil filter drainage to provide a novel control device for effectively containing oil from a filter upon removal of the filter from a vehicle engine and thus eliminating the environmental and safety issues associated with hot engine oil dripping onto the frame of the vehicle, onto the vehicle engine, onto mechanics and/or the ground.
It is a further object of the tool for oil filter drainage to provide a novel installation in which oil from an oil filter to be removed from a vehicle engine can be removed from the filter and safely diverted to a waste oil container.
It is still a further object of the tool for oil filter drainage to provide actuation of a piercing pin to quickly and effectively open the oil filter to allow waste oil flow into a containment vessel and exit the containment vessel through a channel which can be connected to a waste oil container.
It is yet still a further object of the tool for oil filter drainage to provide a novel tool for oil filter drainage which can be reused and/or connected quickly without extensive use of tools or knowledge of complex mechanical considerations.
Yet a further object of the tool for oil filter drainage is to provide a stoppage proof waste oil drain channel that eliminates an obstruction potential for typical spin-on type oil filters while the oil filter is still attached to a vehicle engine.